8 Takeaways: Qualification at Ankara 2016

Last updated: 6:55pm Wednesday 2 March UTC+2.

The qualification sessions in Ankara saw the senior recurve archers take to the competition field in the morning, accompanied by the junior compounders, followed by compound men and women, along with recurve juniors, in the afternoon. First round matches in all categories followed immediately at the end of each round.

Take in the headlines below or recap the full results from the early stages of competition in Ankara.

1. Brady on Form

Brady Ellison topped the recurve men’s leaderboard over the 60-arrow ranking round, by a point, with 595. Ellison, who’s made no secret about his wish to break the world record at 18 metres (held since 2001 by Michele Frangilli at 597), said he felt tense during the session.

“I didn’t shoot how I wanted. I had a couple of arrows called out and it was a bit slow. But I’m happy to be ranked first and heading into the head-to-head rounds I’ll think I’ll start to feel a lot better,” he said.

Brady won his first match, 6-2, by putting all 12 of his arrows into the 10-ring.

Second seeded archer Yudo Maeda, who qualified with 594, had worse luck, losing to his Japanese compatriot and the 31st seed Tomoki Sugio in the first round.

2. Sibling Rivalry

Gizem Elmaagacli, sister of Turkey’s first outdoor Archery World Cup Champion since the season finale in Mexico City four months ago, Demir, displayed some of that family form.

Her 590 led the compound junior women’s rankings, two points up on the USA’s Cassidy Cox and Alexandra Savenkova from Russia.

3. Commitment pays off

“In the first half I was more comfortable with my technique,” said Lisa Unruh. “In the second half there were a few things where I thought, ‘oops’, but then the next shot was better again and then I moved on. I’m really enjoying these world championships so far.”

Unruh dropped 10 points over the 60 arrows for 590 total, landing first among the recurve women.

Japan’s Tomomi Sugimoto seeded second, three points behind, followed by Claudia Mandia, from Italy, trailing by another two.

4. Working the Officals Hard

During the morning first round match phase, five contests went to a tiebreaker: Both archers shoot a single arrow to decide who advances.

All 10 of the athletes, two per match, posted perfect arrows with their single shots: All 10s. Out came the measuring sticks, and the judging crew had work to do.

5. ORosz: National Record

“Second is alright.” Dynamic-shooting Hungarian Viktor Orosz was pragmatic about his 593, good for the compound junior men’s number two seed.

“In the last ends I had two nines, but the rest was good. I felt good and I’ve just been told it’s a new national record, so I couldn’t be much happier with that.”

Orosz won the junior world title two years ago in Nimes.

He was pipped to the top spot over qualification in Ankara by Grecian archer Christos Aerikos. Christos scored 594.

6. All-Italy, All-Afternoon

Italian archers took all four of the top seeds available in the afternoon qualifying session.

The Sultan of Smooth, and recent Lucky Dog Vegas Winner, Sergio Pagni took number one in the compound men’s spot with 597. Pagni also defends his World Archery Indoor Champion title in Ankara.

“I hoped I hadn’t finished my luck in Vegas,” he joked afterwards.

Irene Franchini was number one of the compound women, and David Pasqualucci and Tatiana Andreoli first in the recurve junior men’s and women’s competitions, respectively.

7. Russian Teams Edge All

Four of the top seedings in the team competitions went Russia’s way, three were Italian – and the last, the recurve women’s pole, was Germany’s.

The Italian compound men’s team had an impressive four point advantage over Denmark after the 60-arrow round, buoyed not only by Pagni’s top score, but Luigi Dragoni landing third individually, just a point shy of his compariot’s leading total. 

8. Laursen: “Planned it Right”

The ever-strong Danish compound men’s triple threat – Patrick Laursen, World Archery Champion Stephan Hansen and Martin Damsbo – trained by competing on inside-out 10s ahead of the competition. (Inside out means shooting dead centre, not even touching the line of the tiny centre ring.)

“I didn’t win,” Laursen admitted. But he did qualify best of the three: Fifth (joint with third) on 595, his best score of the season. “I planned it right. Everything just went perfectly today. We’ve got a good chance in this competition.”

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